Sara Elkamel
Balding the Desert
after Carl Phillips
I have no idea why you packed
a bag full of goat skulls
then drew yourself
climbing three quadrants of sky,
the skulls
on your back. I am not imagining.
When we crossed,
we grazed their ghosts
until we hit sand. It
was all very fast like the future tense
spoken at dusk. It was all
red, much more
than I thought. What
would it have been
if not red? There is a kind of love
that changes the color
inside you. There is one
that makes itself a needle
and squints its eye so
nothing could come through.
There was skin of yours
everywhere
on my back and
in my palms, but I was
thinking that could have been
the sea, or the
leftover gunpowder
from that single bullet you pinned
on the goat’s head.
You call this kind
sacrifice. Something you do with
your eyes open
or just
with your eyes.
At night,
the distances between things grow
shorter.
All we have is looking
at each other.
Like one of those
skulls
on whom the shadow falls
drowning
its eyes.
after Carl Phillips
I have no idea why you packed
a bag full of goat skulls
then drew yourself
climbing three quadrants of sky,
the skulls
on your back. I am not imagining.
When we crossed,
we grazed their ghosts
until we hit sand. It
was all very fast like the future tense
spoken at dusk. It was all
red, much more
than I thought. What
would it have been
if not red? There is a kind of love
that changes the color
inside you. There is one
that makes itself a needle
and squints its eye so
nothing could come through.
There was skin of yours
everywhere
on my back and
in my palms, but I was
thinking that could have been
the sea, or the
leftover gunpowder
from that single bullet you pinned
on the goat’s head.
You call this kind
sacrifice. Something you do with
your eyes open
or just
with your eyes.
At night,
the distances between things grow
shorter.
All we have is looking
at each other.
Like one of those
skulls
on whom the shadow falls
drowning
its eyes.
Finally the land is surrounded by seeds
1. I remember them saying your feet could never ever enter a land you were not
destined to see. You go where your rizq takes you, nowhere else, they said.
2. Your rizq is yours but it is god’s gift to send you.
3. If you’re all the way at the gate waiting to cross over, but you don’t have adequate
rizq, you can forget it. Even if you desire it.
4. You want and I want and Allah does what he wants.
5. If you’re at the gate / if your mother is on the other side / suffering / if it’s the
last day on earth / and there’s no light left / if you want to leave / if everywhere
there are rats that look like figs / figs that look like rats / if you need blood / or
other things / like mangoes / distance / if the other side holds him / if it holds
her / if you want them all / if there’s no way back / if heaven is in fact gated and
it is waiting / forget it.
6. The exact contours, the limits of lands, are not stipulated. Truth is, there are
many smaller lands inside large lands. Many gates. Your rizq may allow you entry
to the stone outside the ocean but not the ocean.
7. How does one enter stone? Or women? And if god would nod his head, and you
could enter, would you still stop at the gate for fear? Lethargy? Generalized
anxiety disorder?
8. Lands are of different sizes and they have whims of their own.
9. There are windy days when you cannot dock.
10. Stormy skies when you cannot come down.
11. Suddenly the birds broke all over the side of the sky I thought you’d come from.
--
Sara Elkamel is a journalist and poet, living between Cairo, Egypt and New York City. She holds an M.A. in arts and culture journalism from Columbia University. Her writing has appeared in The Guardian, The Huffington Post, Mada Masr, Guernica, The Common, Winter Tangerine, and elsewhere.